Dan Wetzel is right - the best thing Ryan Howard could do, if he beats Maris' record, is to stand up at the end of the season and volunteer to take every drug test that's currently in use. He won't, of course, and I'm aware that the shadow of HGH would linger even if he does, but it's nice to think that an athlete might care that much about keeping the game clean.

Innocent until proven guilty is a nice thought, but unrealistic in our sports culture today. Baseball's drug testing isn't comprehensive and it's possible to get around. If I were Ryan Howard, I'd take every test known to man. If he's clean, it's just that much more impressive.

Jeff Rodgers is right on the money. Innocent until proven guilty is great to say but thats not the way things are in sports today. If it was McGuire, Sosa and Bonds' records would not even be discussed at possibly not legit because none of them failed a drug test.

Barry Bonds holds the record plain and simple. If you want to speculate on his "legitimacy" than do so with EVERY player who looks suspicious. Let's say Clemens' records are not true, or Gagne's saves, etc. Everyone wants to dismiss the multitude of other players, MANY pitchers included (pitchers have had more positive tests than position players) who have done some type of PED.

Again, it's not even the PEDs alone. Ever era has had some type of controversy (dead-ball, juiced-ball, spitters, ball marking, etc.). If every form of cheating ended in the dismissal of records, our HR king would probably have 40 something and pitchers would have much worse historical stats.

I'm a Phillies fan, and I see no reason to throw away Bonds' record. To deny that steroids have been in the game for 40 years(not just 20) is naive, and to deny that HGH is still in the game is also naive. Howard could be on it, who knows?

Innocent until proven guilty still stands as far as "proof" is concerned. But fan speculation and public opinion is based on circumstantial evidence -- not what's admissible in a court of law.

People will speculate that Howard is taking performance enhancing drugs, and the circumstantial evidence is there to back up that speculation.

Frankly, we know steroids were present in the game with such players as Caminiti, Bonds, Sheffield and Giambi. Who knows whether they are still present in those players or others, and who has taken them over the last 10 years. That being said, I refuse to blindly accept that every player is clean until someone admits his use (e.g., Canseco, Sheffield, Giambi) or until tests confirm that he used. So there is an air of doubt with respect to accomplishments that deviate too far from the mean.

I think it's wise to point out, since we're going down the innocent-until-proven-guilty road, that none of the big boppers have ever been found guilty of cheating (save Raffy).

So why would there be any controversy over the records? Show me the Sammy Sosa test results. Show me the Barry Bonds test results. Show me the Mark McGuire test results. For crying out loud, show me the Jose Canseco test results! He admits to being the poster child of steroids, yet we still don't have any negative test results of the man. Crazy!

Are you the same Dan Shanoff who likes to keep reminding us that there is no reliable test for HGH?

"No suspicions"??

Come on, Dan. When John Kruk says this year's numbers are up due solely to the weather, I laugh, but someone like you shouldn't ignore the fact that the reason steroids has us so sad is that we spent a couple decades with our happy little blinders on.

I find anything John Kruk says about steroid to be funny. He was on the 1993 Phillies. Steroids are the only reason that team made the playoffs. David Justice called a spring training game 2 years ago for ESPN and said "That team had a couple of monsters on it" during the middle of a steroid discussion.

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DanShanoff.com is a sports-blog spin-off of my long-time ESPN.com column, "The Daily Quickie." Anchored by an early-morning post of must-know topics, the blog is updated frequently throughout the day with new posts and user comments.